We've already had the Hollywood happy ending to the Iraq War. It was Bush's Sheriff Top Gun appearance on the Abraham Lincoln on May 1, with the huge "Mission Accomplished" banner behind him.
But if there is going to be a happy ending to the war in reality, it would most likely come by a swift change in the current approach which would place the occupation under a genuinely international military force and political authority, with full United Nations authorization.
That's what needs to happen. Because it's not in the interest of America or of the rest of the democratic world for Iraq to be a failed state that serves as a cause and provides a training ground for Islamic terrorists.
But a big part of how we got into this mess was that the hardline hawks in the Bush Administration relied on wishful thinking and substituted their own ideologies for reality. The historian Henry Steele Commager used to quote James Madison as saying that theory may mislead us, so experience should be our guide. Both parties in the US need a heavy dose of that kind of pragmatism about now on Iraq.
And that's why I've expressed such skepticism about the current show Bush and Rummy are making of seeking a new UN resolution. (Of course, it's Colin Powell who actually gets out front when they try to put a friendly face on their policies. Which never lasts too long.)
Because without a serious, substantive change in their previous course in the occupation of Iraq, trying to make the UN a collective "fall guy" for the Iraq mess is just an empty public-relations gesture.
- Posted by Bruce Miller 09/04/03
Tags: iraq war
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